Episode 9: Fairies, pixies, witches and no three wishes…
Oz, Ed, and Jim all were lying in the living room of the Viajero Bandido waiting for dinner. It was Ryoko's turn to cook something and she waited until everyone started yelling at her to cook something before she even got up. Now they were all on their backs with roaring stomachs, waiting for some kind of food to be placed before them.
"Uhhhh," Jim groaned.
"Damn," Oz mumbled.
"Edward is hungry," Ed had a small trail of drool emerging out of the corner of her mouth.
Ryoko was in the kitchen preparing dinner for everyone. She heard their groans and simply replied cheerfully, "Be out in a minuuuutte, I'm just putting the finishing the touches on!"
Oz rubbed his stomach in an effort to calm it, "Good," he said to himself. He closed his eyes to relax further and then realized something, "Hey wait a minute," he said to himself, "I haven't heard or smelt anything cooking this whole time, what the hell could she be making in there? Cereal?" Oz stared at the ceiling furrowing his forehead thinking about this. It wasn't bothering him enough to make him get up, but it certainly sparked his curiosity.
"Okay everyone her it is!" She brought out a big plate with something stacked on top of it, she placed it down on the table and looked around, "Well eat up!"
Everyone sat up to see a big plate full of peanut butter sandwiches. At first had a look of mottled surprise, but took a sandwich and began eating. Ed wasted no time in wolfing down her food and gulped down a whole sandwich in two bites. Oz sighed, expecting more, and grabbed a sandwich.
"You know Ryoko," Oz began and swallowed a bite of his sandwich before continuing, "When I said I wanted something that had lots of protein in it for dinner this isn't what I had in mind." And it really wasn't, Oz was hoping for a steak or some other kind of meat product, at least hamburgers.
Ryoko looked at him, then rested her head back on her arms "Well," she said, pausing to levitate a sandwich and direct it to her mouth for a large bite, "Be mo spedific neff dime." Ryoko's speech was impaired by the large globules of peanut butter in her mouth.
Oz frowned at that and gave a resigned sigh to her response. He simply sat back and returned to eating his sandwich. After finishing his meal he leaned back and rested on the couch. The last few weeks had been interesting to say the least, he'd already knocked heads with nearly a dozen people, all after him for the bounty on his head. And he had earned the scars to prove it. For the most part they were just nuisances, two-bit bounty hunters and thugs out to make a quick dollar. For now he was glad he hadn't run into any pirates of the Dark Guild or any other kind of sorcerer. It was also a good thing that the Ctarl Ctarl hadn't tried anything. That in itself was surprising, it was in the nature of a Ctarl Ctarl to accept a challenge like that, and seek fortune. He decided that he was still hungry and grabbed another sandwich. Taking a bite he said, "You know I wanted meat."
Ryoko looked at him with a frown, "Well meat costs money we don't have." And she went back to eating her sandwich.
"Well how the hell did we spend it all so quickly?" Oz asked.
"Because of all those damn people after you! It cost money to reload, refuel, and repair you know!"
Oz had forgotten all about that for a second, realizing he was wrong he sat back again, "You could have at least used jelly," he mumbled.
"Ryoko's right Oz," Jim started, "Most of the guys that came after you weren't worth anything, and the ones that were worth something were only worth chump change."
Oz sighed, "Yeah, why can't anyone important try and kill me?"
"Or anyone good at killing for that matter," Ryoko interjected.
Oz glared at her and she winked in return. "In any case we're gonna need cash soon, so we gotta do something."
They all nodded in agreement and began to think of possible solutions.
After some time of deliberation, Ed came up with an idea. "Edward knows!"
They all looked at her in curiosity.
"Okay," Oz said, "Whatta got Ed?"
"Oz can go fishing," Edward went through the motions of a good cast. "All these fishies in the sea, if you only catch one please let it be meeeee."
Oz wasn't sure how to react, "Look Ed I like to fish too but what the hell does that have to do with anything?"
Ed simply continued on, "Wormy wormy on a hook, what's his name and what's his cause? I know his name! His name is Oz!"
"Oooohhh riiiiggghhht!" Ryoko brightened up, "That's a good idea Ed!" Ryoko looked over at Oz and gave a sly grin.
Oz perked up and eyebrow, then finally realized it himself, "Hell no."
"Come on Oz, you know it will work." Ryoko coaxed.
"Yeah it will, and that's why I don't want to do it." He responded sternly.
"Well," Ryoko began, "It's that or we can try and catch a bunch of small time bounties to make up for it."
Oz pondered this then responded, "If we do that we might even make more money than with your idea, I mean, how do we know the next guys to come after me will be worth anything?"
"That hasn't been a problem so far, and you know, the way things are going I'm willing to bet that the next people to try anything will be worth some cash, you notice how they've been worth more each time?" Jim added.
This was indeed a fact. True, they were all annoying, and not much in the way of trouble, but for every one of them, there was someone who wanted them gone, even the small timers. And the longer that Oz lived and the more people he defeated, the more intrigued the big-timers became. Oz thought about it a little more. He made a big sigh and answered, "Fine I'll do it."
Ryoko kissed him and the others grinned. "But YOU GUYS are gonna help me on this, you'll be my back up in case I need it."
"Sure thing." Jim said.
"Roger!" Ed saluted.
"Sure, I'll probably even end up saving your ass." Ryoko added
Later, on Planet Morpheus…
Oz Cortez walked down the busy streets of Kabira City. The city had started out as a small colony and within a few decades boomed to become a major space port and trading post. It has also earned a reputation for crime and underground operations. Being that the team was very close to this planet and its' reputation it was seen as an ideal spot to make themselves known. Ed had made no efforts to use false identification for the ship when they entered port and so it was decided that this would make it easy for anyone looking for their ship. "Hope this works," Oz mumbled to himself as he walked down the street. He had been walking for a long time now and decided to get something to eat. Feeling ethnic he decided to find a Mexican restaurant; he settled for a small hole-in-the-wall stand and ordered some tacos de carnitas. "Not bad," he commented, being a person raised with traditional Hispanic meals he had become an excellent judge of quality food. He was surprised to find anything even half decent as far out as they were, and decided to order some more.
After eating Oz continued on his walk and decided to take a less populated route. He had the distinct feeling he was being followed and was willing to bet that whoever was coming after him was waiting for him to be more alone. Oz reached into his jacket nonchalant and pulled out a gun just as he was hearing close slow footsteps. They were nearly in sync with his but the sound was distinct, like high heels or boots. It was when he heard the footsteps speed up that he decided to turn and aim. As he did so he saw the silhouette of a woman in a long dress and coat levitate upwards and towards him. He pulled the trigger four times and heard her screams.
"You dirty sonuva.." She began to say, but didn't have the chance to finish, Oz pulled the trigger again to finish her off.
"Sorry girly but I'm no get-rich-quick bounty head." As Oz was about to prepare to contact the others, a beam of energy flew so close to him that it burned his jacket. Oz dived and rolled to dodge the next shot at him. He twirled around and aimed his gun at the figure in the air shooting at him, another woman. Oz fired furiously but soon realized it would do no good. The bullets stopped dead in front of her as a shield lit up in front of her.
The woman laughed out loud at Oz's efforts, "You really think bullets will stop us?"
"Well damn it worked for her!" Oz yelled while using his free hand to point at the corpse. "Hey! Who's 'we' anyways, your friend here is dead."
"Good riddance to her, she wasn't that smart anyways, but I guess you already figured that out," She laughed again, "Oh and 'we' is us right here." She spread her arms out and Oz saw two more woman materialize out of no where. The first woman was wearing a black and red kimono and had some medallions hanging from her neck, her hair was long and an unnatural red. One of the other women wore leather pants and boots and a long black trench coat. She also had a large yin-yang on her shirt and short black hair. The last girl had a dress that seemed to be out of the Victorian Era. It was a magenta with white and her hair matched her dress. "We are the Dark Mistresses, we specialize in the ways of a rare hybrid of black magic and a black art that focuses dark chi."
"Doesn't sound too scary, more like Boogie-Woogie Feng- Shui; so you gonna redecorate my house so it fills with negative chi and I don't feel comfortable in it or what?" All the while he was talking he prepared to reach for his casters.
The woman showed some anger then gave a wry smile, "No, we'll do much much worse than that to you Oz Cortez."
Oz seized the opportunity to pull out his casters, "Hey!" he said as he aimed, "That sounds almost kinky!" As he said that he fired with both casters. The woman were caught off guard and managed to block the shots just in time.
"You idiot!" the leader yelled, "Hurry, surround him you two!"
Oz ran into an abandoned building and waited. He had his casters ready to shoot.
"Got you!" the Victorian girl yelled.
"No you don't" Her joy was short lived, as soon has Oz said that she was blown away by a #5 and a #10 simultaneously. She was slammed by a mass of energy and a surge of power that causes the body to convulse and break. Oz heard her bones crack as she was slammed in to the nearby wall. He grimaced at the sound, "Man, tough break for the pixie princess, and I didn't even get my wish."
"Damn you!" the leather clad girl yelled, "You'll burn for that!" Just then a wall of fire flew towards Oz.
Oz fired a shot from one of his casters to counter it and jumped out of the way. He reached for his communicator, "I could use some help about now Ryoko!" He turned to fire his last shot from his other caster at the girl. Quickly he holstered one of his caster so that he could reload the other. He held a shell in between each finger and loaded the three in quickly, locked the cylinder back in place and fired again. The shell he fired created solid ice all around the witch, but she quickly broke free of it.
As the leather girl broke free she screamed, "No more of these damn games!"
Oz responded, "I'll say, you've already lost half of your team! For magical fairies you really suck at this."
"ARRRGGHHHH, we are not fairies or pixies you goddamned outlaw!" As she was about to incinerate him with a massive energy attack she was suddenly hurled down to the ground. Ryoko appeared where the girl had been. She looked down at Oz and winked, then a beam sword materialized in her palm and she clenched it, flying towards the leather clad witch. She lifted the beam high to come down hard on the girl. The leather clad woman crossed her forearms above her head to block the energy. As she did this Ryoko dematerialized and was behind the girl. She slashed at her back, catching her off guard. The girl screamed and turned around to punch Ryoko. Ryoko blocked the punch and the witch used her other hand to fire a wave of energy at Ryoko. Ryoko was sent flying back and stopped herself in midair. "Not bad girly, but you're parlor tricks are lame," Ryoko grinned and then became stern as she clenched her fist and powered up, creating waves of glowing energy to rise off of her.
Oz saw this go on in the air and decided it would be in his best interest to focus on the new task at hand, which was to find the fourth girl. Finding her was no problem, since she appeared a few yards in front of, levitating a short distance above the ground. "Well hello there!" Oz said.
"Oz Cortez, this wasn't anything personal at first, but seeing as you've killed my sisters," red energy began to rise off of her in waves like fire, her eyes turned blood red, "YOU"RE GOING TO SUFFER FOR ALL THAT YOU'VE DONE!" She sent a large sphere of energy straight towards him the size of a small car.
"OH NO YOU DON"T," Oz took a shot from one of his casters to cancel out the spell. As the smoke cleared he resumed taunting the woman, "Now now Tokyo Rose, I'm no good to you if I'm all in pieces, then you can't collect on the bounty on my head! Bas pixie, NO!" Oz brought up his other caster and began to pull the trigger, "You need to learn to put business before pleasure!" He fired another shot. He decided then to fire both casters at the same time. Oz saw all the energy from the incantations flying around where the witch was, and he began to think that she still wasn't dead. His fears were confirmed she was still standing there as the smoke was clearing. Oz holstered the caster in his left hand and reached behind him to last section of his belt and pulled out one shell. He checked to make sure it was the one he wanted and loaded it into the caster in his right hand. "You know you girls are really expensive to kill!" He pulled up his caster and aimed it straight at the girl.
She was irked at first upon hearing Oz using the 'pixie' insult again, but then the kimono wearing witch simply laughed, "I've just made you waste four shells and I haven't even broken a sweat, what makes you think one more will do it?" She gave a wide smile and laughed again.
Oz grinned in return, "Oh yeah," he said confidently, and pulled the trigger. The caster fired a concentration of black energy that spiraled into a sphere as it approached the witch. The sphere then stopped right in front of her.
The witch realized what she was dealing with and her grin immediately faded away, "OH NOOOOOO" she screamed as the #4 shell began to suck her into oblivion, she realized huge amounts of energy in a desperate attempt to break fear, and for a few seconds it seemed like she would succeed. Her entire body became contorted as if it were water swirling down a drain. She screamed for a few seconds more, struggling to break free and quickly disappeared it nothingness. A sudden bolt of black energy shot back towards Oz and he nearly fell to his knees from the pain, gritting his teeth to hold on the pain. "Damn I hate using those things," He managed to say to himself in hoarse voice. Oz ran towards Ryoko and the leather clad witch to see how the fight was going. As he had expected Ryoko was holding her own. They were engaged in sword play using energy beams. The leather clad witch managed to throw Ryoko into the ground and saw it as the opportunity she needed to finish off Ryoko.
"You're done Ryoko," She yelled as she flew with her arm straight out holding the beam sword.
"I'll show you done!" At the last second Ryoko came up to stab the girl in the stomach. She had left herself completely open, just as Ryoko knew she would. Ryoko let the beam stay in her long enough for her to go limp, then it disappeared and let her collapse to the ground. Ryoko stood up and brushed off the dirt that had gotten on her outfit. "Well, just as I predicted, I saved your ass once again." Ryoko had a smug look on her face.
"Right," Oz said, "I just took care of three of them, by myself, and you saved my ass?" Oz said incredulously.
"Lets not forget who asked for help okay?" Ryoko pointed out.
"Well yeah, I knew you were around, why the hell would I want to take on those crazy women on my own! You're hard enough to handle." Oz added, knowing that Ryoko would become defensive.
"Oh? And what the hell is that supposed to mean?" Ryoko crossed her arms and waited for an answer.
Oz laughed upon seeing this, "It means I know a few ways to irritate you," Oz winked and Ryoko rolled her eyes, realizing that he was joking. She stuck out her tongue to save face.
By that time police cars and aircraft had the area surrounded. Ryoko looked over at Oz, "Looks like we attracted a little too much attention on this one."
"Yeah," Oz pulled out his tech-brick and contacted the police department to explain the situation. After doing so the police came and collected the bodies. Oz checked the faces of the Dark mistresses, at least the three that were left (since one was sucked into oblivion), and found that they were worth a grand total of $10 million. Oz grinned upon seeing this number (especially since they were wanted 'dead or alive,' had it been any other way it all would have been for nothing), "well it looks like it was worth the trouble." Oz showed the number to Ryoko and she smiled as well.
At the police station…
"We'll take it in 50's and 100's please," Oz said, "Oh and bag for us okay?" Oz leaned on the counter and waiting for the money to be placed in front of him.
The police officer grabbed stacks of money and began counting, "One, Two, Three, Four, annnd Five million, there you go." The police officer bagged it for him and handed it to Oz,
The smile on Oz's face faded away, "Hey wait a minute, those girls were worth twice that!"
'That's right but we took the liberty of deducting damage costs and fines you acquired from this little escapade." The officer said calmly and matter-of-factly.
"How the hell could we rack up $5 million in damages!" Oz asked excitedly.
"That's what I'm wonderin', but we've crunched the numbers already and you've managed to do it." The officer responded.
"But, but, but.." Oz stammered.
The officer began to drum off some of the fines, "Damages to public and private property were over $4 million, fines made up the rest."
"How did we cause $4 million in damages!"
"Well actually, the girls you nabbed did most of it, but since it was your bust, the law states that the damages are thereby the responsibility of the apprehender or apprehenders."
"But still, how could it be so much?"
"A few old buildings were demolished, construction and demolition without a permit, $2 million dollar fine here." The officer said.
Oz stood there awe struck, "I hate those fairies," he mumbled, and turned and walked off.
Ryoko had been waiting outside the station leaning against the wall. "So did you get it all?" Ryoko inquired.
"No, only half on account of damages and fines," Oz answered.
"What! But most of that crap was from those girls!" Ryoko said.
"I know, but since we were the apprehenders, the cost falls on us. It's one of their laws here."
"Dammit," Ryoko mumbled. She stopped walking and turned around to flip off the police station, an officer saw and raised an eyebrow, but did nothing more.
Oz sighed, "Well at least we can have meat now." He put his arm around Ryoko's waist and they walked together back to the ship.
So much for three wishes…
To be continued…